An acclaimed ecologist and author, Sandra Steingraber explores the links between human rights and the environment, with a focus on chemical contamination, climate change, and shale gas extraction via fracking. She takes a personal and scientific look at these issues and offers insights into how we can protect our environment and our communities. Steingraber brings a clear, lyrical voice to the complex evidence of biology.

Highlights

FIFTH EDITION RELEASED!

March 13, 2018 — Co-authored by Dr. Steingraber, the Compendium of Scientific, Medical, and Media Findings Demonstrating Risks and Harms of Fracking is a fully referenced compilation of the evidence outlining the risks and harms of fracking. Bringing together findings from the scientific and medical literature, government and industry reports, and journalistic investigation, the Compendium is a public, open-access document housed on the websites of Concerned Health Professionals of New York and Physicians for Social Responsibility. More than 400 new studies have been published since the fourth edition was released in November 2016. This fifth edition identifies 13 major scientific trends in the data and provides important updates on topics ranging from water contamination and air pollution, to worker deaths and earthquakes. Rolling Stone called the new edition, “the most authoritative study of its kind.”

UNFRACTURED WORLD PREMIERE: Thursday, October 19, 2017

“Unfractured takes us through a battle of astonishing international significance and into the life and mind of a complicated and compelling woman…”

Watch the trailer for the upcoming documentary, Unfractured. Produced and directed by Living Downstream filmmaker Chanda Chevannes, Unfractured follows Dr. Sandra Steingraber, “as she reinvents herself as an outspoken activist and throws herself into an environmental war that many believe is unwinnable.” See the film website here.

“Democracy, like the climate itself, has tipping points”: Lessons for Our Time from Rachel Carson

On November 30, 2016, Dr. Steingraber addressed the Rachel Carson Council’s 75th Anniversary Jubilee Celebration and Colloquium in Washington, DC. Her remarks were updated and adapted for a column on Bill Moyers’ website, readable here.

New York State Becomes the First State with Significant Shale Gas to Ban Fracking

On December 17, 2014, at the conclusion of New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo’s cabinet meeting, acting Health Commissioner Howard Zucker recommended the state reject high-volume hydraulic fracturing. The Cuomo administration will now move to prohibit fracking statewide. Dr. Steingraber: “This victory is an incredible affirmation of science and the principles of public health.”

“Our beautiful lake is being turned into a gas station for fracking“

On November 19, 2014, Sandra Steingraber was sentenced to jail for the second time for peaceful civil disobedience in defense of Seneca Lake. Dr. Steingraber was arrested with others while protesting Texas-based Crestwood’s plans for gas storage expansion in abandoned salt caverns along Seneca Lake, in the Finger Lakes Region of New York State. Just before her sentencing, Dr. Steingraber videotaped an interview with the Laura Flanders Show, introducing viewers to We Are Seneca Lake, an ongoing civil disobedience uprising to protect the region.

May 2014 Letter to New York Governor Cuomo and Acting Department of Health Commissioner Zucker

Sandra Steingraber is co-founder of Concerned Health Professionals of New York (CHPNY), an initiative to amplify the voices of hundreds of health professionals in New York about fracking. On May 29, 2014, joined by 25 health and medical organizations and over 200 individual health professionals and scientists, they wrote, “[t]he totality of the science… shows that permitting fracking in New York would pose significant threats to the air, water, health and safety of New Yorkers.” Read the full letter

A New Environmentalism for an Unfractured Future: European Commission “Green Week” 2014

Sandra Steingraber Speaks on the Health Impacts of Fracking in Pungesti, Romania

Short Video: Fracking and the Un-Hoodwinking of America

New Yorkers Against Fracking

In 2011, Sandra Steingraber received the prestigious Heinz Award. By donating the cash prize to the anti-fracking movement, she became, in 2012, the co-founder of New Yorkers Against Fracking, a statewide coalition of more than 280 grassroots organizations.

Americans Who Tell the Truth Portrait

Robert Shetterly’s Americans Who Tell the Truth (AWTT) portraits and narratives highlight citizens who courageously address issues of social, environmental, and economic fairness. See AWTT’s page on Sandra Steingraber.

Science, Women, Civil Disobedience, and Filmmaking in a Time of Climate Emergency

Unfractured Screening

In the Media

“One of the speakers that night, Sandra Steingraber, a biologist and distinguished scholar in residence at Ithaca College, urged legislators to read the recently issued report from the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. ‘What it tells us is that methane is a more powerful greenhouse gas than previously appreciated and that natural gas infrastructure, including power plants, leak a lot more than previously known,’ she said.” Quotes from Steingraber frame this piece in City & State New York. Read the article

“What united everyone … was a sense that this is the moment now to not let the fossil fuel party continue by allowing this old Eisenhower-era coal burning power plant to make a lateral move to burned fracked gas hauled in from Pennsylvania…” Steingraber appeared on WCNY’s the Capitol Pressroom discussing the Tompkins County New York Legislature’s resolution opposing the conversion of the Cayuga Power Plant. Listen here

“As we’ve traveled across the length and breadth of this state, we’ve had so many enthusiastic audiences… people are really interested in taking a hard look at what it means to blow up the bedrock of Pennsylvania to extract fossil fuels.” Steingraber appears with filmmaker Chanda Chevannes on ABC 27 News’ Good Day PA during their speaking and film screening tour of Pennsylvania. Watch the clip